Re: The Certain Death Tournament.
RIP Argoel, Jaheira, Mara, WitherStick, GeneralJoe, and Icybiatch
@Alfonso: nope, they were all rares in the Andy drop. Other than the IK gloves, she didn't drop anything useful.
Several times in Act II, the valk actually died! :dizzy: Mostly, she would die to multiple bosspacks with nasty mods, though, and she never died too fast.
Physical immunes and unleechables became a fairly big problem, mostly due to the various skeleton and wraith type monsters. Killing the skeletons so they can't be ressurected is possible with a 1 point unsynergized FA. It gets tedious fast, though... Spamming FA, or even just strafing can empty my mana bulb quickly if I can't leech enough, so I ended up with a very bad blue-pot habit.
After I'd gotten to the Far Oasis and cleared it all, I took a break. When I came back, I went to the Maggot Lair, and got the staff. It was very long and tedious, and although I was fine in the straight passages, it was tough near the corners, since I had to be so cautious. After that I needed another break.
When I came back again, I went the relatively short distance to the entrance to the Lost City. Unexpectedly, it took quite awhile. And since I'd already cleared this area, I couldn't pick anything up. I didn't think anything good would drop on that short trip. I was wrong. There were 4 bosspacks in my way, the first dropped Iceblink, the last dropped Venom Ward, and one of the two that were clumped together in the middle (and kept killing my valk with their extra strong/cursed/fanaticism aura) dropped... a
Mal! I've never even seen a Mal before, and it would really go great in 'Prudence' (25-35% res all, 17 MDR, etc), and I can't use it. :banghead: Oh, well, at least this way I can give it to an SC character who won't end up losing it by dying.
Then I got to the Lost City, finally allowed to keep things that drop, and what do you think dropped next? Nothing. :unimpressed: Eventually, however, a Crusader bow dropped, which I chippy-cubed twice and got this:
Code:
Grinding Crusader Bow of Quality
'EthEth'
Two-Hand Damage: 15 to 123
Required Dexterity: 121
Required Strength: 97
Required Level: 57
Bow Class - Slow Attack Speed
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 25
Fingerprint: 0x50dfd8b3
+2 to Maximum Damage
-50% Target Defense
+58 to Maximum Damage (Based on Character Level)
Socketed (2: 2 used)
I put the Eth runes in, since my CtH was at a rather dismal 63% or so.
I had my first of two rather scary NDEs in the Ancient Tunnels. The valk was tanking a cursed pack of Assailants (the 4-armed guys), and I had a decoy out between the bosspack and me. I had gotten cursed just by being within about half a screen of the valk when the boss cursed her, but hadn't bothered going to town to get that fixed, since I was in a good position and the valk was tanking quite well. Then, for no apparent reason, one of the minions ran over to me, past the decoy, and hit me while I was in the middle of a strafe cycle. I couldn't have had more than about 30 or so HP left. I drank a rejuv pot and ran. After being de-cursed I came back and finished them off, more carefully this time.
Fangskin's pack was also scary, although not an NDE. The decoy couldn't take much of a beating, but it was cast between me and a nearby claw viper several times, and that and the knockback from strafe kept them off of me, but only barely. Fangskin himself died offscreen somewhere, and I never actually saw him alive.
The second scary NDE was in the Palace, when some archers in the other room shot past my valk and decoy and hit me. I believe the first hit took ~1/2 my life, and that I drank a healing pot, then got hit with another before drinking a rejuv. I'm not sure exactly, and I might have used a purple after the first hit. Either way I ended up using 2-3 purples and deciding to skip those guys and just move on.
In the arcane sanctuary, I found another
druid summoning skiller. The game apparently is confusing me with a summoner, but given how I'm abusing Valkyrie and Decoy, I'm not so sure I'm not half of the time. :whistling:
Also in the arcane sanctuary, I ran into a rather dangerous boss.
FE/LE/teleportation. And naturally physical immune. Whenever I got him hurt, he'd start teleporting around. I'd got him pretty close to dead, but then he started teleporting, and he ended up right next to me with about two of his teleports. At that point I got nervous, so I decided to leave him alone. He didn't want to leave me alone, though, but I eventually got in a good position to strafe without being in range of his lightning bolts, and kept him in hit recovery often enough that he died.
Tal Rasha's tomb was as incredibly tedious as I'd anticipated, as I used my level 1 unsynergized FA to kill off the burning dead minions so they couldn't come back. Finally I got to
Duriel, and he was pretty easy. Not quite as easy as in NM, though, he ignored the decoy I cast in his face and tried to come after me. I ran around the room in a circle, but then he started paying attention to my valk. The valk held up very well, although you could visibly see her lifebar dip sometimes. I kept a decoy behind her to keep her from getting knocked back. It took forever, though, probably due to a combination of poor damage and poor CtH (LCS said 57%, although the 2 Eths in the Crusader bow might have improved that slightly).
Duriel dropped Ichorsting, but nothing else interesting.
[highlight]ancalagon, Shatterproof, strafer, lvl 78, Kurast Docks (H)[/highlight]
:tombstone:
...
hmmm and with added vampires and zombies as well
